>>If it was botched from the start, then I have no idea how to define a success in this case. Can you do that?
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>Of course.
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>Just like I can look at a set of requirements and somebody's attempt at implementing them in software.
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>I can scracth my head and say "why the hell did they do it that way?" and then try to track down all the personal background information on the comptuer programmer, to try to understand the way he thinks.
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>Or you could say "well, I know how it has to be done" and just do it.

Except that a programmer's state of mind is the wrong one to use when dealing with live people. We're too used to the read/write/delete paradigm. You can't just run it and see what happens (like most economic theories are tried ;).

Worst case, you can always pull the plug and reinstall the stuff later. Can't do that on a country. (now I can hear someone say "it's been done over and over already")

>So how to define success? I'd say stable democractic Iraqi and Afghani governments within a decade or two.

Definition accepted. Is theocracy a democracy?

>A success to you, it seems, would be an injurous blow to Bush, though I think he's already received it.

No, it would be a prerequisite to the success. And I don't want to see a blow, I want to see justice done. Who lied, who stole, who embezzled, who leaked - regardless of the altitude of their position and the bandwidth of their connections, should be tried. If not possible domestically, outsource to The Hague.

>Do you honestly think that Iraqis have gained no freedoms since Saddam's rule?

I'm brought up to believe that any country with foreign army calling the shots in it is by definition not a free country. The bits of freedom defined as access to the ballots to choose politicians to serve under a foreign army installed regime... that's not democracy. Once the local government has the mandate to tell the foreign army to leave, we can talk. Until then, it's a puppet government.